


PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 



PROCEEDINGS 



PUBLIC MEETING 



FANEUIL HALL, 









Juxe 7, 1876. 




^WA$V 

BOSTON : 

FRANKLIN PRESS: RAND, AVERY, & CO. 

1876. 



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*^> 



CONTENTS. 



Organization of Meeting 5 

Speech of Mr. Joseph S. Eopes 7 

" " Mr. George B. Chase 10 

" " Mr. Richard H. Dana, jun 11 

" " Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes 20 

'■ ■" Rev. Rollin H. Neale, D.D 26 

" " Rev. J. P. Bodfish 27 

" " Col. Charles W. Wilder 31 

" " Mr. Joseph F. Paul 33 

" " Hon. P. A. Collins 36 

Letter of Dr. Edward H. Clarke 38 

Committee of One Hundred 45 



FANEUIL HALL MEETING 

IK 

FAVOR OF PTTBLLC PARIES. 



Pursuant to a call published in all the daily papers, and 
signed by a large number of prominent citizens and tax-payers 
of Boston, a public meeting was convened in Faneuil Hall on 
the evening of Wednesday, the 7th of June, 1876, to take action 
on the recommendations contained in the Report of the Park 
Commissioners. The hall was crowded by an intelligent and 
enthusiastic audience ; and the proceedings, as reported verbatim 
in the columns of the "Boston Morning Journal," were as 
follows : — 

The meeting was called to order at eight o'clock by Mr. 
John W. Candler, who said, — 

Gentlemen, — As Chairman of the Committee of Arrange- 
ments, I have been requested to call this meeting to order. It 
is usually the case, that, when a mass meeting of citizens is to 
be held, a great deal of labor has to be performed in preparing 
for and organizing the meeting. But I am glad to say, that, on 
this occasion, the important advantage of having a public almost 
entirely in our favor was enjoyed by the Committee. We found 
a strong and intelligent and deep-seated sentiment almost 
unanimous throughout the community, in favor of having the 
City Government take prompt and favorable action upon the 
report of the Park Commissioners. [Applause.] We found 
the community earnest and enthusiastic in the desire that a 
system of parks should be projected for the city of Boston, to 
insure the health, and to make certain and positive the prosper- 
ity, of our citizens in the future. The Committee had only to 



6 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

present the call or address through the press, which some of 
you have read, to find hundreds ready to indorse it ; and the 
authorities had only to open wide the doors of Faneuil Hall to 
have the people throng here, as they have to-night, to manifest 
the sentiment which they feel so generally. 

Gentlemen, we have with us to-night men of science, philan- 
thropists, the representatives of the learned professions. We 
have the capitalist ; we have the merchant ; we have the me- 
chanic ; and we have the daily laborer, who toils from the rising 
to the setting sun, — we have them all here, to give out a voice 
to-night, expressing the opinions of the people, which can 
neither be misrepresented nor misunderstood. [Applause.] 

It is not my duty, gentlemen, to make a speech. You have 
here this evening to address you, the representatives of every 
class, the best that can be afforded in any city, the leading men 
of the city of Boston in the different professions. It is only 
necessary, in the discharge of my duty, that I should read to 
you the names of the* gentlemen whom you will be asked to 
elect as the officers of this meeting. They are as follows : — 

PRESIDENT. 
The Hon. JOSEPH S. ROPES. 

VICE-PRESIDENTS. 

Charles Francis Adams, William Amort, Richard Frothingham, Peter 
C. Brooks, Martin Brimmer, George C. Richardson, Benjamin F. Thomas, 
Edward S. Rand, Henry P. Kidder, Thomas J. Gargan, Eben D. Jordan, C. 
A. Richards, John C. Crowley, William B. Bacon, Aaron D. Williams 
Charles F. Donnelly, Wm. W. Clapp, Benjamin Deane, Richard Olney, 
William Atherton, Thomas Gogin, William Endicott, jun., Albert Bow- 
ker, Daniel J. Sweeney, Patrick T. Jackson; R. M. Pulsifer, Roland 
Worthington, John G. Blake, M.D. J. H. Chadwick, Lewis Coleman. 

SECRETARIES. 
HAMILTON A. HILL. WILLIAM E. PERKINS. 

The list of names was unanimously approved ; and the an- 
nouncement of the election of the gentlemen named therein 
was received with applause. 



SPEECH OF MR. JOSEPH S. ROPES. 7 

Mr. Candler continued, I have the honor of introducing to 
you Joseph S. Ropes, Esq., a merchant of Boston, who has 
been called to fill a great many places of trust, and who has 
always been found able in the discharge of every duty, and 
faithful in eveiy trust committed to him. 



SPEECH OF MR. JOSEPH S. ROPES. 

Fellow-Citizens, — I thank you for the honor you have 
done me in inviting me to preside on this auspicious occasion. 
You have come together to-night, not to quarrel with one 
another's politics, not to abuse one another's rival candidates, 
but to hold a friendly consultation upon one of the most impor- 
tant and interesting and agreeable subjects which can engage 
your attention, — the subject of public parks for the city of 
Boston. [Applause.] 

Gentlemen, I was born in Boston ; and I well remember the 
time when our cows were pastured on Boston Common, when 
the Back Bay, was not a myth, but a reality, and when at least 
a portion of the summit of Beacon Hill was covered with green 
fields, on which were seen sometimes "raree shows " and trav- 
elling menageries. Since that time, our city has grown and 
swelled, and stretched itself north and south, and east and west, 
striding over one arm of the sea, filling up another, swallowing 
the neighboring towns one by one, taking two mouthfuls for 
Roxbury, and one for Dorchester, and one for Charlestown and 
Brighton together, until -it has expanded its population seven- 
fold, and its area almost seventy times seven, within fifty years. 
Yet there stands Boston Common just where and just what it 
was — no larger, and thank heaven! as yet no smaller [loud 
applause] — than it was fifty years ago. 

Where are the breathing-places for this enlarged metropolis ? 
Where are the places of common resort for quiet and healthful 
enjoyment and peaceful recreation for this expanded population ? 
Where are the noble parks and the wide-spreading groves? 
Where are the places fit for public entertainment, which we find 
in every other large city in the civilized world? — such as we 



8 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

see in London and Paris and Berlin and Vienna and Florence 
and Rome and Naples — yes, even for the few brief months of 
summer, in the northern capitals of Stockholm and St. Peters- 
burg ? And echo answers, " Where ? " [Laughter and ap- 
plause.] 

" Gone like a vision ! " 

My friends, I need not tell you that this matter has excited 
the interest of our philanthropic and public-spirited citizens, 
and especially of the medical faculty, to whom it is, in its 
sanitary aspect, a matter of most important practical interest. 
And, through their representations to the city government and 
to the state legislature, a bill was brought before the legisla- 
ture, which I had the honor nryself to report in the House of 
Representatives a little more than a year ago, and which was 
passed by large majorities in both houses, authorizing the city 
of Boston to purchase and to take lands within its o\y\\ limits 
for laying out public parks, and to co-operate with adjacent 
towns in laying out conterminous parks for the common benefit 
and advantage of citizens on both sides of the line. 

This measure was opposed (as all such measures are opposed) 
on the ground that " it would lead to jobbery and extrava- 
gance." And the answer was ready at hand, that all public 
enterprises are liable " to lead to jobbery and extravagance," 
but that the abuse of a good thing is no argument against its 
valid use [applause] ; that it is for the citizens themselves, and 
for the government of the city of Boston, to see that their trust 
is rightly and honestly carried out. 

Again : it was argued that the people of Boston possess already, 
in their beautiful suburbs, all that is required in pure air and 
beautiful scenery. And this, again, is most true as regards 
those who live in those suburbs, and those whose wealth enables 
them to pass to and fro in their carriages, and regale their senses 
with the luxury of what they there find. But what application 
has this, my friends, to the working-man, to the masses of our 
population, whose sole idea of the suburbs consists of an hour's 
rattling drive in a crowded street-car, and an hour's seat by the 
side of a dusty thoroughfare ? 



SPEECH OF MR. JOSEPH S. HOPES. 9 

Again : it was argued that the city of Boston could not afford 
this expensive luxury of parks. And to this again it was easy 
to reply, that so long as the city of Boston could afford prisons 
and jails, and any number of millions spent for liquor and for 
hurtful indulgences, and for the repression of vice and crime, 
it could afford to spend money for this peaceful and healthful 
and elevating enjoyment for the people. 

In a word, gentlemen, this bill became a law ; and, in pursu- 
ance of that law, a Commission was appointed by the city of 
Boston, the names of the gentlemen composing which Commis- 
sion I need not repeat to you ; for they are in all your hearts, 
as well as on all your lips. The Report of that Commission is 
now, and has been for weeks, in your hands ; and it is the object 
of this meeting to indorse that Report, and to stimulate and 
incite the government of the city of Boston to act in accordance 
with its suggestions. We cannot expect that all its details will 
be approved by every one ; nor are we to suppose that all its 
details will be carried out in action by the government. But it 
is not too much to say that it is so well digested, so full and 
complete, and in every way so satisfactory to the city and the 
citizens, that we cannot do better than recommend it as a whole 
to the municipal authorities. [Applause.] 

Now, my friends, it is not for me to do what will be so much 
better clone by those who succeed me on this platform, — to give 
you the reasons, and enforce the arguments, for your action at 
this time. But as a representative of the city of Boston, as an 
almost constant resident within it for nearly thirty years past, as 
in my humble sphere a representative of the merchants of Bos- 
ton, as a taxpayer of Boston, and in every way identified with 
the best interests and all the highest and best aims of our city, 
I call upon you to-night to adopt and to indorse and to com- 
mend this admirable system to our city government. [Applause.] 
I have now the pleasure of introducing Mr. George B. Chase, 
who will present the resolutions. 



PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 



SPEECH OF MR. GEORGE B. CHASE. 

Mr. President, ; — On behalf of the committee who have had 
in charge the arrangements for this meeting, I have the honor to 
offer for its acceptance several resolutions which have been 
prepared for it by a gentleman, than whom none is more versed 
in all that relates to the business questions and interests of the 
city of Boston, and who, during long and faithful service as 
secretary of the Board of Trade, became familiar with all sub- 
jects relating to the development and prosperity of the city. It 
is hardly necessary, Mr. Chairman, in such a connection, to men- 
tion the name of Mr. Hamilton A. Hill. [Applause.] 

Mr. Chase then read the resolutions as follows : — 

Resolved, That this meeting would hereby emphatically 
re-affirm the opinion which has been expressed, at the polls and 
elsewhere, by the citizens and tax-payers of Boston, that the 
time has arrived when this city should be provided with a park 
or parks similar to those which have been projected by the other 
great cities of the United States, adapted to the wants of our 
large and steadily increasing population, and on a scale commen- 
surate with the growing commercial importance and metropoli- 
tan influence of the cit} r . 

Resolved, That the plan for a system of parks and parkways, 
prepared and recommended by the Park Commissioners, com- 
mends itself to this meeting as broad and comprehensive in its 
general features, fair to all sections of the city in its details, 
admirably suited to meet all the necessities of the case, and 
promising, when carried out, to make Boston one of the most 
healthful, attractive, and beautiful cities in the world. 

Resolved, That the pressing need which exists for a radical 
improvement of the sewerage in some parts of the city, the 
present cheapness and abundance of labor, the diminished value 
of land, and the exceptionally favorable terms on which the city 
can now negotiate for money, render it of the first importance 
that there should be no delay on the part of the city government 
in the acceptance of the proposed plan, and in the adoption of 
decided and vigorous measures for carrying it into execution. 



SPEECH OF MR. RICHARD H. DANA, JUN. 11 

Resolved, That this meeting would therefore respectfully and 
earnestly ask for immediate and favorable official action upon 
the Report of the Commissioners, and that the chairman and sec- 
retaries are hereby authorized and requested to communicate a 
copy of these resolutions, properly authenticated, to his Honor 
the Mayor, and to each branch of the City Council. 

Resolved, That a committee of one hundred be appointed by 
the Chair, to represent this meeting before the city government, 
and to secure the desired action by it without loss of time. 

The Chairman. Gentlemen, you have heard the resolu- 
tions, which evidently meet with your unanimous approbation. 
You will now be addressed in behalf of these resolutions 
by one who needs no introduction from me, Mr. Richard H. 
Dana, Jun. [Prolonged applause.] 



SPEECH OF MR. RICHARD H. DANA, J 



Fellow-Citizens, — I thank you from the bottom of my 
heart for this very kind welcome I have received at your hands 
to-night on coming upon the platform. I assure you, gentlemen, 
if I felt at liberty to waste the precious hours of this evening 
upon any thing relating to myself, I could say much more than 
I do to thank you for your great kindness. 

But, gentlemen, we are met here on public business. You 
have heard what we are asked to do. We are asked to petition 
the city government, and send a committee of force to the city 
government (not as if the government were at all reluctant, 
but that they may know the feeling of the people of Boston), 
and ask the city government to go to work at once, and see 
that Boston has, as soon as possible, these necessities for her 
honor, her health, and her beauty. [Applause.] 

In thinking of this subject, Mr. President and gentlemen, 
it occurred to me that it was a very singular fact, and not 
altogether to the credit of human nature, that great numbers 
of persons cannot live together without extreme inconvenience. 
Now, Robinson Crusoe, when he lived on the Island, of Juan. 




12 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

Fernandez alone, was not troubled with any question of public 
parks, or drainage, or health. Things took care of themselves. 
But when you get two or three or four hundred thousand Robin- 
son Crusoes in a few square miles, you find the whole state of 
things is reversed, that you require all the patience, all the 
science, a large part of the money, and a large part of the indus- 
try, of the population, that you may live at all, and on any terms. 
The lower parts of our nature, the animal parts, tend to produce 
certain results which the intellectual parts are expected to meet 
and control. If they do not that, men become savages ; if they 
do, they are enlightened. 

Now, in this great and enlightened city of Boston, the pride 
of us all, the "Athens of America," as we all know we are 
[laughter], and, as our friend Dr. Holmes there has told us, 
the "Hub of the Universe" [laughter], it would hardly be 
respectful to say that one of the questions before us was, Which 
of those two roads we were going to take, — whether we were 
going to let the intellectual and moral parts have the upper 
hand, or whether we were going to sink beneath the material 
part. And yet, gentlemen, that is a good deal the question that 
is before us to-night. 

Why, look at the progress which is inevitably made where 
you get great numbers of human beings together. You must 
have drainage, 3^011 must look to the health of the population, 
and then you must look to their recreation and their amuse- 
ments (for they will have them) ; and, if they are not good and 
creditable and honorable, they will not cease to exist, but they 
will come before us in the most shameful and unwholesome 
form. We used to be told, gentlemen, that Boston had natural 
parks all about her, and she did not need any artificial parks. 
Well, now, I am not in favor of any artificial parks. All I ask 
is, that the beauty of the environs of Boston may be preserved. 
[Applause.] 

We are on the defensive. We are defending the wholesome- 
ness and the beauty of our beloved city against this encroach- 
ment of population. W r hy, the time was — Mr. Ropes will tell 
you when the time was — when the Back Bay was a beautiful 
sheet of water, filled at high tide, carrying the healthful air 



SPEECH OF MR. RICHARD H. DANA, JUN. 13 

through the whole city. But then the necessity of population 
called for its filling up, and it is now piled in upon, and we have 
there now what Dr. Clarke called " a natural cesspool." 

We changed the Back Bay from a beautiful bay, where the 
wholesome tides of the ocean swept in, to a natural cesspool. 

Well, now, look at the lanes and roads in the suburbs of Bos- 
ton — beautiful. As you ride over them, there are trees hang- 
ing over them, and there are bushes on each side : you say it is 
charming. Well, go out there the next year. The selectmen 
if it is a town, thp city government if it is a city, have changed 
all that. They have made a straight line right through it, and 
widened the streets sixty feet ; cut down every tree, and made 
it one of the most disagreeable and painful spectacles that the 
eyes could rest upon. It is their duty so to do : it is a neces- 
sity. And so you go on destroying the beauties of the city, 
destroying its wholesomeness, destroying its charm ; and now 
we have got to meet that tendency, and we have the power to 
meet it. We have the intellect, we have the money, we have 
the will, and we have the taste ; and we would be incensed if 
any one should suggest that we do not. And yet we have 
allowed every city in the United States to get in advance of us. 
[A voice, " That's so."] Chicago has three thousand acres 
of parks ; Philadelphia, five thousand ; New York, one great 
park [of about one thousand acres ; and almost every city in 
Europe has better, more handsome and attractive accommoda- 
tions than the city of Boston. I am ashamed to say it ; but it 
is so. I trust, however, gentlemen, that, before I ever have the 
honor of addressing you again, we shall have taken the first 
step to remove this odium from the city of Boston. [Applause.] 

Some six years ago, I think it was, the people got greatly in 
earnest that this park should be undertaken. They saw that 
the progress of the manufactories was fast destroying the beau- 
ties of Boston ; that they were taking up the land in the suburbs 
apidly : and, when I said that your green lands were destroyed, 
with their beautiful curved lines, I forgot to mention that your 
beautiful sheets of water are in the same danger. Why, look 
at Fresh Pond, look at Jamaica Pond ! They are beautiful 
objects to gaze upon : but when manufactories begin to surround 



14 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

them, when there are soap manufactories and tanneries, and I 
do not know what, draining into the pond, the result is, that the 
water is unwholesome, that the fish die, the water cannot be 
drunk, and then physicians begin to tell their patients, " You 
had better move out of that neighborhood." Are you aware, 
gentlemen, that that is coming upon us, that we must meet it, 
and avert it ? 

Some years ago, the people of Boston were earnestly in favor 
of a park, or system of parks. The legislature, for some reason 
or other, required that the project should receive a vote of two- 
thirds of the people. That was extraordinary and hard. But 
it did receive a vote of two-thirds of the people of Boston 
proper, and more than two-thirds ; but from the accident of a 
newly added portion of the city, for some reason or other, tak- 
ing a slant in a certain direction, they voted very largely against 
it, and it fell through. We must [take warning from that ; for 
land that would have made then a handsome park, which we 
could have had, we cannot have now at all. It would cost 
altogether too much to much to take dwelling-houses and fac- 
tories and railroad beds, if we could, for a park. 

Well, after six years of restlessness, at last we went before 
the legislature again ; and we got an act passed, authorizing the 
appointing of commissioners with powers. That act passed, 
helped by our most able fellow-citizen, Mr. Ropes, chairman of 
this meeting ; and it was submitted to the votes of the people 
of Boston ; and the park project was carried by the votes of this 
entire population, — Boston, East Boston, Charlestown, South 
Boston, Dorchester, Brighton, which make, all together, a very 
large and most decisive majority. And therefore, gentlemen, the 
question is not, Shall we have parks? you have decided that; 
but the question is, Whether, having determined to have them, 
we shall rest content with saying so ? whether we will have 
our paper parks, as we have our paper money, with nothing to 
rest upon [laughter] , or whether we shall have genuine parks, 
with life and trees, and have sheets of water? Now we are 
here to-night to say it is the latter that we want. [Applause.] 

Fellow-citizens, that statute authorized the appointment by 
the Mayor, subject to approval, of three commissioners. Well, 



SPEECH OF MR. RICHARD H. DANA, JUN. 15 

that was wise. It was not nine, seven, nor five ; but it was three. 
Well, his Honor the Mayor, who has - presided with so much 
dignity, wisdom, and integrity [applause] over the city of 
Boston for two years, — and we would be glad to get him for a 
third year, if his health would permit it [applause], — his Honor 
the Mayor appointed three gentlemen as commissioners, in whom 
this community have entire confidence. There are no politics 
among the Board of Commissioners ; there is no jobbery in the 
Board of Commissioners ; and I will venture to predict, gentle- 
men, that, when they finish there task, there will be no investi- 
gation. [Great applause.] 

I was amazed on looking over their charge. Why, I found 
an item of coach-hire for the whole period of their service, nine 
dollars. Why, it would not have been enough to take three 
common councilmen from Parker's or Young's. [Laughter.] 
But it is all they have charged ; and how, on that sum, they 
succeeded in riding around Boston, I do not know. Their 
experience with persons who let carriages must have been much 
more favorable than mine has been. But not only have they 
done honorably, economically, and frugally, they have put into 
their work an amount of brain-labor, an amount of patient 
investigation and of good judgment, which no one can have an 
adequate opinion of who has not read their book ; but, if he has 
not, I hope he will. And at least this I may be allowed to say, 
I do not think any citizen of Boston has the right to object to 
those parks, or to be silent or indifferent on the subject, unless 
he has read th e Repor JLJlf the Commission, and knows what is 
proposed, and has been done. [Applause.] They have consulted 
the best authorities. They have consulted Mr. Frederick 
Law Olmstead, who laid out Central Park in New York, and 
he is the highest authority on the construction of parks in the 
country ; and he has been all over this neighborhood, viewing 
the localities, and they have taken every thing into consideration ; . 
and, gentlemen, what is the result ? They do not propose to u 
one great park of a thousand acres, at an almost unattainable 
distance ; they do not propose a great park that nobody can get 
to, unless he gives a day to it, and a good deal of money : but 
they have adopted a system based upon the natural character- 




16 PARKS FOB THE PEOPLE. 

istics of the neighborhood of Boston. And what better could 
they do ? At East Boston, they have given them a park upon 
the water-side, where they will always have the fresh breezes 
of the sea. AlTSouth Boston, they have given them a park upon 
the water-side, one directly opposite Fort Independence, and 
then another one, called the South Park, larger ; and Chester 
Park, which you are all familiar with, is already extended, and 
nearly ready to be used as far as Beacon Street ; and thence it 
is to go over to Cambridge, and be the quickest means of access 
to the University. That same avenue is to be extended easterly 
till it strikes the farthest of the South Boston parks, opposite 
Fort Independence ; and, when that is done, you will be able to 
drive or walk, according to your powers of walking, from the 
park opposite Fort Independence, into the city, and across it, to 
Harvard University. 

Now that is a good deal ; but they have taken another step. 

They propose to take the water-front of the Charles River basin ; 

and there is nothing in Nature so beautiful, so well adapted 

•to the needs of a city, as a park, or boulevard, or promenade, 

directly on a water-front, especially if that water is sea- 

water, — if it is brought in and carried out by two daily tides. 

What more beautiful, what more wholesome, what more invigo- 
rating, during the hot season of the year, than to have an open 
boulevard, where you can sit, or walk, or ride, — a place for 
the fresh sea-water of the ocean brought in pure to you every 
day ! Well, they mean to preserve that, and give us about 
two hundred feet for a driveway, a saddle-horse way (a saddle- 
pad, I think they call it), and footpath, a place for flowers 
and trees, as it extends along the water-side, beginning by 
Leverett Street, and going out as far as Brighton. Then from 
there they mean to take this great Back Bay, which Dr. Clarke 
properly called a natural cesspool, and keep a large part of it 
under water, the ocean to be let in and let out at our option, so 
that it can be always kept pure ; and yet such a quantity of it, 
that it will be a sort of inland sea, where we can have regattas) 
and where every gentleman may keep his boat, and every boy 
may keep his scull ; and perhaps it is just as well a boy's skull 
should be there as anywhere else a large part of the time. 
[Laughter.] 



SPEECH OF MR. RICHARD H. DANA, JUN. 17 

Then, gentlemen, they are going to take Jamaica Pond, 
and have a park or driveway around the pond ; then the 
Chestnut Hill Reservoir, that has a parkway one hundred feet 
in width, where you can drive or walk at your pleasure. In 
West Roxbury they are to have a mountain-park, which will be 
the largest (about five hundred acres) ; and it is well called a 
providence, because it is high, it is rocky, it has a thoroughly 
sylvan look, like a forest. You would feel as if you were fifty 
miles from Boston, if you were where you could not see the 
city. At the same time, it is beautiful for a park. There are 
very few houses there ; and it is difficult to make it salable for 
residences. But they have selected this spot ; and they are 
going to give us the best park of the city, and then have all 
these parks connected by parkways, thus making them so con- 
venient of access, that every poor man in Boston can take his 
child by his hand, and for five cents a head can be carried out 
to any one of those parks by the railroads. [Applause.] 

And, when he gets there, he can show this poor bo} r or girl, 
who has passed all the winter, and all the opening spring, in an 
alleyway, — he can show them, by a wholesome ascent of two 
hundred feet only, slow, gradual, one of the noblest prospects 
in the world, — the ocean pouring up into these great bays, and 
floating the great ships that come and go, the Bunker Hill 
Monument and the Navy Yard, the University, and the great 
series of cities that surround us. And, more than that, he can 
show him or her Wachuset Mountain, and even the top of 
Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire. 

Now I ask you, fellow-citizens, if it is not worth while for 
the city of Boston to improve these opportunities. We have 
been most fortunate in our Commissioners, — in their wisdom, 
in their frugality, in their intelligence, and their public spirit ; 
and I hope, gentlemen, you will study their Report. It is easy 
reading, pleasant reading ; and if, when you get home, you find 
your boy or girl engaged over some novel, especially if it is a 
yellow covered one, take it right out of his or her hand, and 
ask them to read that Report. 

You may think it absurd ; but, ten to one, it will interest the 
children more than the novel would. It will certainly give 



18 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

them more valuable instruction ; and I venture to say it will 
interest them more. I felt quite carried away by it. It seemed 
to me it must be a fancy ; but, when I turned to their accounts 
(and they are all mercantile men), I was amazed to see at what 
small cost it could all be done. And, gentlemen, I want to 
detain you a moment longer on statistics, and show that it has 
increased the value of property in every city that has had a 
park, by bringing houses all about the parks, and by detaining 
as inhabitants of the city, to be taxed in the city, those men 
who skulk in small towns to throw the burden of the expense 
of their own city on those who stay behind. [Applause.] All 
we want to do to-night is to say to the city government that 
we are in earnest about this matter, and that we want the work 
done now. [Applause.] 

I tell you, gentlemen, it is very doubtful, if this fails, whether 
you will have another Board of Commissioners to compare with 
the present. I tell you it is doubtful, whether there will be a 
state of things in Boston which will be any thing like as favora- 
ble as the state of things we are in now. But I can tell you one 
thing that is certain ; and that is, if you postpone it, you cannot 
have the parks that they propose. The growth of population 
will be crowding over it ; speculators will buy it ; the ponds will 
become injured ; and the expense will be so great, that you will 
shudder at the thought of it. And, more than that, the parks 
that you ask for in another ten years will be four or five miles 
from the centre of population now, and I confess that one great 
argument with me for instant action is, that I want the parks to 
be as accessible as possible to all those persons especially who 
do not own their private carriages, and cannot give a day to 
it. [Applause.] 

And last of all, Mr. President and gentlemen, it should be 
done for economical reasons, as has been stated very well by 
the address and in the resolutions, because there never was a 
time, and I hope there never will be a time again, when the land 
was so cheap as it is now ; and, when we take this land for parks, 
we take it at its present price. There has not been a time for 
many years, and I hope there never will be a time again, when 
the price of labor is as low as it is now [applause] ; and that 



SPEECH OF MR. RICHARD H. DANA, JUK. 19 

labor we would employ at once, and the laborers are begging 
for employment. Why, there is not one of you who has not 
often and often, within the last two years, perhaps it is not 
extravagant to say, felt his heart bleed when he has been 
stopped in the way by evidently honest men, who would say, 
" We can't find any thing to do. We have looked everywhere ; 
and there is no work for us." [A voice, " That's so."] Yes, 
that is so. Now, some philanthropists, and some political econo- 
mists, have told us that the government ought always to find 
employment for everybody ; it is the duty of the city to see that 
everybody has work : but, though I do not advocate any such 
doctrine as that, I advocate this doctrine, — that whenever the 
community has any thing it ought to do, and which will employ 
laborers (and this is a hard time on the laborers), then is the 
time that they ought to do it. [Applause.] So that it is 
not only good economy, but it is humanity, that dictates an 
instant advance upon this work. To save the land that we 
can get now in a low market, and to employ laborers who 
are paid low wages, but are glad to get even that, and 
to prevent the entire failure of this scheme so carefully and 
beneficially made, we shall ask the city government to work at 
once. 

Now, there are others much more able to speak of the finances 
of the city government than I am ; but we always do find, that, 
when a thing ought to be done, there is a way of doing it ; and 
we sometimes find, that, when things ought not to be done, there 
is a way of doing them. I wish to say one word more, before I 
take my seat, on the report and scheme of these Park Com- 
missioners ; and that is its entire equitableness in its attention to 
localities. It has left no part of the city that is not benefited. 
Charlestown cannot have a park, because it is built over, and 
there is no room for one. If there was room, they would have 
one. They must annex ; and then they can have a park. 
[Laughter.] East Boston has a park ; South Boston has a park ; 
then comes the great West Roxbury Park ; then comes the Bus- 
sey Farm, which I omitted to mention ; and then comes Jamaica 
Pond and Chestnut Hill Reservoir Park, and the park roads 
connecting them all, and uniting them ; and then the water-front 



20 PARES FOR THE PEOPLE. 

on all that part of the city of Boston where the water-fronts are 
not needed for commerce. 

I say, therefore, this plan is equitably divided among the 
citizens according to their residence ; and it is accessible to all, 
and the plan is economical, and the time is auspicious. There- 
fore I hope that you will with unanimity adopt the resolutions, 
and call upon the city government to proceed at once. [Ap- 
plause.] 

The President. Allusion has been made to the " Hub of 
the Universe ; " and you will all understand, that, when any 
thing is the matter with that Hub, the diagnosis must be made 
not only by an able physician, but by an able spokesman. 
[Laughter and applause.] I have great pleasure in introducing 
to you one who combines both, and a hundred other qualities, 
Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes. [Applause.] 



SPEECH OF DR. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 

You will not ask for rhetoric or eloquence in the few remarks 
upon a vital subject to be offered you by a member of the silent 
profession. What could be so eloquent as the hollow voice 
which announces the Boston annual death-rate as being 26.18 
against 23.7, that of the great paved nation of London ; 
against 19.3, that of Philadelphia ; and approaching that of our 
two unhealthiest cities, New York and New Orleans ? This 
high death-rate has been shown to be largely due to the exces- 
sive mortality among infants and children under five years of 
age. The most fatal of the diseases which assail them is that 
destruction which wasteth at noonday, to which our American 
practitioners give the name of cholera-infantum. And this dis- 
ease prevails chiefly, almost entirely, from June to October, the 
season when all out-of-door influences are most tempting and 
most needed. The weekly record of August and September is 
that of a pestilence. The destroying angel carries off the first- 
born, and, oftener still, the last-born, out of almost every house- 
hold in certain districts, as in the heaviest curse laid on Egypt. 
Thousands have fled the city, as they deserted London in the 



SPEECH OF DR. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 21 

season of the plague ; but thousands are left to follow in the 
funeral procession of those who were the hope of their house- 
holds. 

A considerable part of this mortality, it may be feared, is 
unavoidable. Our climatic influences are permanent factors, 
and must always count in the bills of mortality. But there are 
certain agencies which we can, to a great extent, control. We 
can and do submit the dwellings of our citizens to inspection 
and sanitary regulation ; we can and shall provide our city with 
proper drainage ; we can and do inspect the food in our market, 
and condemn it if unfit for use ; we can and must secure for 
our citizens the influences of unroofed and un walled Nature, — 
air, light, space for exercise and recreation, the natural birth- 
right of mankind. -, 



Of the uses of these larger breathing-spaces, which we call 
parks, — for the relief of the imprisoned dwellers in crowded 
streets, for the recreation of poor and rich alike, for the health of 
mind and body which they offer to all, — it seems almost need- 
less to speak from the medical point of view ; for all know what 
cities would be without open areas, where children can play in 
the shade, and old people warm themselves in the sun. I wish 
to call your attention to a single point intimately connected 
with the alarming fact of the excessive death-rate of which I 
have spoken. That point is the influence of the air they breathe 
on the health of children, with the bearing of this on the ques- 
tion before us. 

If a child is found to have been starved to death in a cellar 
or an attic, a cry of horror is raised over it. If two or three 
wandering boys, as it happened the other clay at Lowell, come 
upon some noxious roots, and, in obedience to their omnivorous 
instinct, devour them, and pay the forfeit, the whole country 
hears of it. If a family or two get hold of some ill-conditioned 
meat, and suffer for it, the groans of their colics are echoed all 
over the land. If a milkman misrepresents his honest cows by 
falsifying their product, the chemist detects him, and the press 
puts him in the pillory. If the Cochituate or Mystic water is 
too much like an obsolete chowder, up go all noses, and out 
come all manner of newspaper paragraphs from " Senex," 



22 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

"Tax-payer," and the rest. But air-poisoning kills a hundred 
where food-poisoning kills one. Let me relate a circumstance 
which happened in Ireland, to which circumstance, in all 
probability, I owe the pleasure of being listened to at this 
moment by some among our hard-working, adopted citizens who 
are before me. 

When I say to you, meaning to speak the words of sober 
truth, that a single physician, by a single and simple measure, 
saved more lives than Avere lost at Waterloo by the British 
army and all its allies, leaving out the Prussians, you will sus- 
pect me of exaggeration, not very uncommon in public speakers. 
I will therefore intrench myself behind certain details which I 
have often before cited, but not in the presence of a gathering 
of this kind. 

Dr. Robert Collins was Master, as it is called, of the great 
Dublin Lying-in Hospital, where the annual rate of births 
was between two and three thousand, from the year 1826 to 
1833. A work of his, containing the results of his practice 
during his seven years of service, was published in Boston in 
1841, by order of the Massachusetts Medical Society, for the 
use of its members. I consider him vouched for as authority, 
therefore, by men in whom you can put confidence. Dr. Col- 
lins makes the following statement : — 

When his predecessor, Dr. Joseph Clarke, was in office, in 
the year 1784, he found that seventeen children in the hundred, 
nearly one in six, died within the first fortnight after birth, 
nineteen-twentieths of these of one particular disease peculiar 
to very early infancy. Looking for the cause of this frightful 
mortality, he thought he found it in a foul and vitiated state 
of the air of the hospital. So he had some openings of con- 
siderable size made in the ceiling of each ward, and three holes, 
of an inch in diameter, through each window at top : the doors, 
too, were perforated with numerous holes. In this way, a free 
circulation was secured, and so arranged, that the nurses could 
not control it ; for some of the old-fashioned nurses would 
not have opened a window in the Black Hole at Calcutta, for 
fear the inmates should catch a cold. 

What was the result of this simple proceeding? Why, the 



SPEECH OF DR. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 23 

mortality fell, from seventeen in a hundred, down to between five 
and six ; and Dr. Collins gives us the result up to his time in 
these words, " Thus, by his valuable suggestions, 16,37.1 lives 
have been saved, as, had the mortality of infants continued one 
in six to this day (1833), the number of children dying of the 
131,227 (which is the total number born in the hospital) would 
be 21,871, as the hospital registry now shows." In the battle 
of Waterloo, the British and their allies lost 16,186 men ; that 
is, 185 less than the great army of very light infantry saved 
from death by letting out the smoke of the battle of life, and 
letting in the sweet air of heaven, through the walls of the 
Dublin hospital. 

So much for what air alone can do for children. Now, it is 
not the " nine-day fits " of that hospital in its unventilated 
condition which kills our poor children in the hot months, but 
that other disease of infancy, which to name is like sounding 
a funeral knell in the. ears of many a parent. This one malady, 
more than any other, gives Boston its place on the black list of 
unhealthy towns. All parents having young children leave the 
city during the worst part of the sickly season, if they have the 
means of so doing. Our best streets look as Defoe tells us 
London streets looked during the Great Plague. But thousands 
of families must remain ; and we are bound to do what we can 
for them in their dearest interests, — the lives of their children. 

With regard to cholera-infantum, — the deadly scourge of 
which I have spoken, — the testimony of experience shows that 
change of air, even temporary, often effects the cure of which 
the apothecary, who " pestles a poisoned poison behind his 
crimson lights," cannot bring about with his drugs, though the 
wisest of physicians had written the prescription. This point 
is so important, and bears so directly, not only on the necessity 
of park-spaces, but upon their distribution so as to bring them 
within reach of all the crowded and unhealthy districts as 
far as possible, that I shall borrow a few sentences, enforcing 
it, from writers recognized as authorities on the diseases of 
children. 

" Even in cases in which a removal to a healthy and airy 
situation in the country is impracticable," says Dr. Condie of 



24 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

Philadelphia, long and well known by his writings, "much 
benefit may be derived from carrying the patient frequently into 
the open air in a carriage, or in the arms, or, when its residence 
is near a large river, sailing it daily in an open boat." And Dr. 
John Bell of the same city says, " The restorative effects of 
fresh air in cholera-infantum are strikingly evinced in the relief 
procured by many hundreds of children every summer in Phila- 
delphia, by their simply crossing and recrossing the River 
Delaware in steamboats once or twice a day. New life is 
restored to the little beings, who, on leaving their homes in the 
city, seemed almost exanimate, and in the last stage of incurable 
exhaustion." Dr. James Stewart of New York, in his treatise 
on the diseases of children, and our own honored patriarch of 
the profession, the late Dr. James Jackson, in his letters to a 
young physician, speak in similar terms of the great advantage 
of change of place and of air. The " aquatic jaunts " recom- 
mended by Dr. Stewart, and spoken of as so efficacious by 
Dr. Bell, are among the advantages to be secured by the plan 
proposed by our Park Commissioners. I wish twenty tons of 
little children could be shipped every fine summer day for a 
good sail. 

There is one particular region which I will mention as like to 
be specially benefited by the plan referred to, — a region which 
would get the advantages of the fresh air coming over the wide 
estuary of Charles River without the expense and trouble of 
taking boats. The narrow and crowded streets of the northern 
slope of Beacon Hill, and a wide region extending northward 
from it, are inhabited by the very class most exposed to cholera- 
infantum and diseases of that nature. Having lived for many 
years in Charles Street, where I am no longer an owner, I had 
occasion to learn the incomparable comfort and delight to be 
got in a hot summer's day, when the wind is from the south- 
west, by turning the corner of Charles and Cambridge Streets, 
and getting into the current of air cooled by passing over the 
water. Some of the poor mothers with sick children had found 
out where to bring them for relief; and I often thought, if there 
were an open green filling up that corner, with shade trees and 
seats, what a priceless sanatorium it would be to all that suffer- 



SPEECH OF DR. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 25 

ing quarter of the city ! The proposed green margin, beginning 
at Leverett Street, and extending along the river, will meet this 
very want ; and this is only one locality of many which will 
thus turn its natural advantages to account. 

I have preferred to insist on a single point rather than to 
expatiate on a larger number. But I trust that the eloquence 
of others will enforce and illustrate the innumerable advan- 
tages our city will derive from the only chain she would submit 
to, — a chain of pleasure-grounds all around her. The Bostonian 
has looked up at the gilded dome of the State House, and down 
at the reflection of his own features in the Frog Pond, long 
enough. Our city has always been a centre ; and it must not 
act as if it considered itself a mere feeder. We must provide 
ourselves with the complete equipment, not of a village com- 
munity, not of a thriving town, but of a true metropolis, large 
enough for a citizen of the world to live in without feeling him- 
self provincialized, and not too large for one honest mayor like 
our own to handle. The marrow-bones of the past are pretty 
well cleared out, or will be before the Centennial year is over, 
and we must not be content to live on them for another century. 
The Old Elm got enough of it, — grew discontented, and started 
on its travels for wider quarters, but, unfortunately, stumbled 
and fell. Let us take the hint, and plant a thousand acres with 
young elms and all other trees of the forest, where the hillsides 
are not already clad in foliage ; so that the children of coming 
generations may bless our memoiy, not only for all the happi- 
ness they have had in their shadow, but for saving more lives to 
the country than were lost in any one of the battles which 
scarred and crippled their fathers. [Applause.] 

The President. Gentlemen, you have been addressed by 
two of the learned professions. It follows, as a matter of course, 
that you will now be addressed by one from the third, the 
most important and most respected of all. I am happy to intro- 
duce to you the Rev. Dr. Neale, the oldest settled pastor of 
the city of Boston. [Applause.] 



26 PARES FOR THE PEOPLE. 



SPEECH OF THE REV. ROLLIN H. NEALE, D.D. 

I do not intend, my friends, to trespass much upon your time, 
and certainly shall not presume to give any new information on 
the subject which has been presented. Owing, probably, to my 
long residence here, it has been thought, I suppose, that my 
testimony, in these days of calling for witnesses, may be of some 
importance. Of the financial bearings of this proposed enter- 
prise, of course I cannot judge. These are to be considered 
and acted upon by men on whom the public responsibility rests, 
who will, doubtless, act considerately and wisely ; but the 
desirableness of the thing itself is unquestionable. I have had 
opportunity, with some gentlemen here present, of wandering 
of a summer's day through the beautiful and extensive parks of 
Europe and of this country, and know how welcome and refresh- 
ing they are to the weary traveller. " Boston Common," of 
course, we praise everywhere ; and when abroad, and thinking 
of dear home, say there is nothing like it the world over. 

It is a good feature in the character of Bostonians to love 
their own city. There is something delightful in its old build- 
ings, and even its crooked streets. We forget political and even 
religious differences in view of ancient landmarks. We cling 
to the Old South, and would gladly have kept Brattle Square 
with its cannon-ball, whatever might have been thought of its 
theology. We cherish the memory of our fathers, and wish to 
keep among us, as far as possible, signs of the good old days. 
This is right and noble ; but equally right, and quite as unself- 
ish, is it to think of those who shall come after us. Horace 
Bushnell was a scholar, and wrote many elaborate works on 
metaphysics and divinity ; but the Bushnell Park of Hartford 
will probably be that for which coming generations will thank 
him most. Certainly it will keep his memory fragrant and 
green forever. 

Our good city is justly famous for its hospitals and physicians, 
as well as its churches and clergymen. I hope the contem- 
plated parks may not supersede the sanctuary and the sermon, 
though, as they say, there are " sermons in stones, and good in. 



SPEECH OF THE REV. J. P. BODFISH. 27 

every thing." But certain it is, that a ramble through green 
fields at any time, and along sparkling streams, is better than 
a sick-bed, or the apothecary's drugs and doses. 

"We are all of us, I suppose, more or less subject to the blues, 
business-men, clergymen, and even politicians. In such cases, it 
is of no use to shut one's self up in the house, and brood over 
trouble. The best remedy is a walk, a good long stretch into 
the country, fresh air, a hearty laugh with some friend ; or an 
exhilarating ride, Brother Murray would say, probably, behind 
a " perfect horse." And these are some of the blessings it is 
proposed to secure for us. The very season now here speaks 
impressively for this enterprise. The glories of a June day, how 
they make us yearn for rural scenes ! Nature everywhere is 
beckoning. " The mountains and the hills break forth before us 
into singing, and all the trees of the field clap their hands." 

The President. We have listened with much satisfaction 
and enjoyment to the address of one of the clergymen of the 
city of Boston : but all denominations of the Christian Church 
are included in this call ; and I am now happy to introduce to 
you the Rev. Mr. Bodfish, Rector of the Catholic Cathedral 
of the Holy Cross of the city of Boston. [Applause.] 



SPEECH OF THE REV. J. P. BODFISH. 

Mr. President and Gentlemen, — I am happy to stand 
here, where so many of my ancestors have stood, and to address 
my fellow-citizens on such a measure of public importance. 
When this matter was first brought to my attention through the 
papers, when the plan proposed in all its grandeur first came 
before my mind, I was reminded of a saying of a musical friend 
of mine. He belonged to a band. He came from the father- 
land ; and his great specialty was to play on the trombone. 
After a while, it became rather remarkable, these solos on the 
trombone ; and some of the college boys wanted to put him 
down a little : so they commenced by applauding. That seemed 
to have no effect. So one night they thought they would try 



28 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

another plan. He was playing his best on the trombone ; and 
one of the boys cried out, " Louder ! " And so he began again 
on the trombone ; and the boys said, " Louder ! " And he tried 
again on the trombone ; and the boys still cried, " Louder ! " 
And they still kept on, " Louder ! " until he almost burst every 
blood-vessel. And he put down his instrument in disgust and 
said, " It is very well to say, ' Louder ! ' but where is you going 
to get the vind ? " [Laughter.] 

Now when I thought of this system, and the immense expense 
it would be, I said to myself, Now, that is a grand system ; it 
would be beautiful indeed : but where are you going to get the 
money ? But then I took the Report of those able Commission- 
ers, this pamphlet that is spoken of; and I read it myself care- 
fully to see if it was a practicable and feasible plan, and was 
surprised to see the ability with which the whole matter had 
been treated. So thorough had been their investigations, that 
they had demonstrated it was perfectly clear that this grand 
and beautiful system of parks could be built at this time, now, 
with a very slight taxation upon the whole business commu- 
nity ; and, furthermore, that by the improvement of property 
in the neighborhood of the parks, and by the advantage to 
the city in general, the money expended would soon return to 
the taxpayers of the city ; and so that objection is disposed of 
at once. 

There seems to be no difficulty. There are so many solid 
men here in Boston, that a work of this kind surely can be car- 
ried out with greater ease than it has been in other cities ; and 
Ave know in other cities they have reaped great pecuniary ben- 
efit from the establishment and building-up of their system of 
parks. But you would hardly expect a clergyman here to talk 
on the financial question : that is a little out of order. But the 
physicians have considered the medical point of view, the sani- 
tary point of view, how necessary it is to the health of the 
city ; and the financiers have demonstrated that it is easy in a 
financial point of view ; and it would be natural for me to 
speak here to-night, perhaps, on the moral necessity of such a 
system of parks. 

Now, when I think of the conditions under which a great 



SPEECH OF THE REV. J. P. BODFISH. 29 

many of our poor people live, I am not very much surprised 
that they are goaded into desperation to commit some fearful 
crime, because we know very well, where a person lives in the 
country, and has the blue sky over his head, and the running 
brooks gurgling through the meadows, and the green trees and 
villages, and every thing cheerful and pleasant about him, why, 
he is removed from a great many temptations that are common to 
a large city; and we know, that, in a moral point of view, 
the people of a town or of a country district are removed from 
a great many temptations and incentives to crime : therefore 
every one who wishes well for the religious welfare of the 
people would be glad to have these parks established as a real 
, moral agent in the community and to the people of this city. 
And, as my respected friend has suggested, perhaps the people 
would rather go out in the park than to stop and hear our dull 
sermons. But I would run even that risk ; for the Lord's Day, 
you know, is a day of rest ; and, after we pay our homage to 
our Creator, I think it would be pleasant even to Him to go 
and take your family, and take a stroll out into these pleasant 
parks that are proposed for your health. [Applause.] 

And then there is another feature which pleases me very 
much. You know, in the olden time, the lords and nobles, and 
those who possessed the landed estates, they felt it their duty to 
provide for the welfare of the laboring classes, upon whom .they 
depended really for their riches ; for they tilled their lands, and 
brought them in their incomes and the returns from their estates : 
and so they watched over them with a kind of a paternal care ; 
and, when they were sick, they provided for them hospitals, and 
they watched over them as a father would over his family. Now, 
we live in a little somewhat different order of society ; but still 
there remains the same common duty for the men of wealth, 
for the men who possess capital, to look out and provide for the 
wants and necessities of the poor, on whom they depend to a 
great extent ; for capital cannot be independent of labor. [Ap- 
plause.] 

Now I see around me, I may say, the nobility of this city. 
They may not have long, sounding titles ; but they have the 
wealth, they have the philanthropy"; and their presence here 



30 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

to-night shows you that they have those same generous impulses 
toward the whole of this city's population. They have come 
here as a unit : they are willing to pay whatever is required to 
build this magnificent system of parks, that all the people of 
every class may enjoy its benefits. I say they are acting the 
part of the nobles of old ; and they are taking care of the people 
of this city as though they had a certain paternal influence and 
responsibility toward them [applause], and it rejoices my heart. 
And in another point of view, we know that the safety of any 
community and society depends upon the contentment and 
happiness of all classes of its people. 

If there is one class that is ground down, and unhappy, and 
living under unworthy conditions, they are, of course, immedi- 
ately a dangerous element. I say that it is a matter of good 
policy, as a stroke of political econonry, to provide for the wants 
of all classes of people in this way, that they may live contented 
and happy, and have every thing that is necessary for the health 
and recreation of their families. [Applause.] 

I cannot, of course, at this late hour, delay you with arguments. 
You have had sufficient already. That, as I understand it, is 
not the chief object of our meeting here. The arguments are 
at present before the authorities in this excellent Report of the 
Commissioners. 

We meet here to encourage them to go forward, to speak out 
in such a positive manner, that they can hesitate no longer. 
It is our duty to cheer them and encourage them in their 
work, and we hardly realize what an influence this meeting will 
have in encouraging them to the great and arduous work which 
they have undertaken to accomplish. Why, it reminds me of a 
little incident that happened in New York not long ago, when 
one of those great buildings was on fire, — those nine-story tene- 
ment-houses. When the great crowd gathered there in the 
night, and they were surging there, the police were trying to 
keep order, and the firemen were working, and the hot flames 
shot up toward the sky, and the black smoke rolled forth, and 
all was din and confusion ; and, in the noise and tumult of that 
dark and threatening night, there was one voice heard. It was a 
mother's voice above the noise ; and she cried, " Save my child ! 



SPEECH OF COL. CHARLES W. WILDER. 31 

Will no one save my child? " And they would hush her; but 
still she cried, " Oh, save my child I " And there was one of the 
brave firemen, when he learned that a little child was in the 
fourth story of that building, who thought of his little ones at 
home ; and he said he would risk his life, he would dare any 
thing, rather than that child should be lost. And they brought 
the great ladders, and they spliced them together, and they 
swung them up against the burning building ; and he commenced 
to ascend. And, when he was halfway up, he looked at the hot 
flames and the dense smoke rolling forth, and his heart trembled 
with* fear : it seemed to be instant death. But some one in the 
crowd below, who knew the springs that govern the human 
heart, cried, " Cheer him ! " " Cheer him ! " And there went up 
from that great crowd the wild hurrah, and it cheered his heart 
like an electric thrill ; and he rushed on, and disappeared in the 
smoke. All was suspense ; they waited with breathless anxiety : 
and at last he returned with the child, and placed it in its 
mother's arms. [Tremendous applause.] So you see the power 
of a word of encouragement and cheer when any one has ardu- 
ous work before him ; and that is our duty here to-night, my 
fellow-citizens, — to speak out with one voice, and determined 
voice, and to cheer those who have undertaken this work, and 
to let them know that we are ready to support them, that now 
is the time, and that we are determined that this great work 
shall be accomplished. [Applause and cheers.] 

The President. I shall now have the pleasure of introdu- 
cing to the audience Col. Charles W. Wilder. [Applause.] 



SPEECH OF COL. CHARLES W. WILDER. 

This large gathering of our citizens in Faneuil Hall is for 
some purpose : it is significant that the people want something. 
I do not understand that it is in any sense to re-affirm their con- 
viction that their best interests will be served by adding to our 
public property a park or parks. That question has been fully 
discussed and decided by the people themselves for themselves : 



32 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

they settled that by their, with remarkable unanimity, voting 
to accept the act of the legislature, giving power to the city 
government to purchase or take land for that purpose. All 
classes seem to agree upon the necessity. The entire medical 
faculty with one voice say we want it for sanitary reasons, and 
have joined in the general petitions. Our capitalists and mer- 
chants have spoken for themselves unmistakably by their peti- 
tions to the city government, bearing more than seven thousand 
names, and representing, I am informed, more than two hundred 
millions of taxable property. An able Commission, after a year 
of careful study, and diligent devotion to their duty, have made 
their report. The people have examined, discussed, criticised, 
and finally approved and accepted it, and now come here in Fan- 
euil Hall to speak direct to City Hall for its adoption. Mr. 
President, our professional men, our merchants and capitalists, 
have spoken for themselves by their petitions and voices here to- 
night. It remains only for me to speak for the more numerous 
class of our fellow-citizens who pay but two dollars poll-tax. 
Yet they are as good citizens, have and feel as deep interest in the 
growth, prosperity, and progress of our city, as their more fortu- 
nate neighbors ; and in the name and behalf of the mechanics, the 
laborei'S, the great mass of men that build our cities, and whose 
labor contributes so much to our growth and prosperity, and 
whose employment is the one thing more than any other needed 
to-day to inaugurate the beginning of our old-time prosperity, 
I appeal to our city government to complete the work so 
opportunely and well begun. It is immediate action we ask 
for. 

There being no difference of opinion as to the necessity and 
utility of parks, and their ultimate payment for their full cost, 
the only open question is the time to begin. We say that time 
is now, — now, while thousands of unwillingly idle hands are 
waiting for work, and money is cheap ; cheap, because labor is 
unemployed. We say to you, gentlemen of the city govern- 
ment, respectfully but earnestly, Act upon this matter now. 

Don't wait till your summer vacation ; don't wait till next 
month ; don't let any personal matter intervene to prevent the 
performance of this public duty the people now ask at your 



SPEECH OF MR. JOSEPH F. PAUL. o3 

hands. The present truly great debt of our city, the bulk of 
which has been created in improvements, made enormously more 
costly by the failure of city governments in past times to com- 
prehend the wants of a growing metropolis, admonishes you to 
act now, and secure the advantages the present favorable com- 
bination of circumstances offers. We confer on you the power 
to spend our money for the public good ; and we ask you to act 
now, because we clearly see that delay means largely increased 
cost for what Ave must have in the near future. 

The President. The Act under which this Commission was 
appointed, and has discharged its duty, was supported, I think, 
by nearly every member of the Boston delegation ; and I may 
be allowed a single moment to add a tribute of respect to that 
delegation. Boston has been well represented, with one excep- 
tion, perhaps, during the last two years, in the State legislature ; 
and I am very happy to know that you are now to be addressed 
by a member of that delegation, who, as I said, supported this 
Act when it was passed ; who did not always vote with me on 
every occasion, but who never voted against his conscience, 
never supported any thing dishonest, or unjust, or unfair ; and 
who will stand up, I have no doubt, to-night, and speak well his 
mind, as he did on every fit occasion in the State House, for 
what he deems just and right, and for the good of the people : 
Mr. Joseph F. Paul, whom I am very happy to introduce to 
you. [Applause.] 

SPEECH OF MR. JOSEPH F. PAUL. 

Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen, — I harclly know what 
reply to make to the remarks of the gentleman who has just 
taken his seat. In fact, I think I had better let them go, and 
allow you to judge for yourselves after I have said what I pro- 
pose to say. I may say, in the first place, that this is my first 
appearance upon this stand as a speaker ; and, when called 
upon to speak after such gentlemen as you have listened to 
to-night, I trust you will make all due allowance for any 
mistakes that I may make. But I claim the right as a citizen 



34 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

of Boston, as a tax-payer of Boston, to express my opinion 
upon this subject, as upon all others in which I take an 
interest. The necessity of parks has been made apparent to 
every gentleman here by those who are better qualified than 
I am to do so. I believe that there is no man here who 
does not believe that we are to have parks. I have not 
heard from such; and I do not believe that there is such a 
man, unless it is one who does not expect to enjoy them 
himself, and is unwilling that posterity should. 

Taking it for granted that that question is settled, the only 
question which seems to be before the people is, whether this is 
the proper time ; and I propose to address myself to the consid- 
eration of that question. I propose to speak of it as of a private 
enterprise, and as an individual business-man. It has been ex- 
plained to you in regard to the condition of the labor-market, and I 
think that I may say fairly and squarely that labor of the character 
to be used about parks has not been so cheap for twenty years. 
Money is cheap ; labor is required ; parks are wanted ; and it is 
better to keep the men at work, and retain them in the city, 
than to sustain them and their families at the public cost. It is 
not like sending out of the country to import something for 
which we must pay our money. All the money is to be paid to 
our' own citizens; and, unless some show of enterprise is made, 
we shall lose business-men from this city. They will not stay 
here, and do nothing, unless the city government makes some 
show of enterprise. I have had some experience myself in the 
city government, having been a member of it, whether that is 
an honor or not ; though I hold that the honor or dishonor of 
any society depends upon one's own conduct. There is always 
some doubt about making a move in the city government ; and, 
in a matter like the park question, such a meeting as this will 
be a great encouragement to action. The public feeling on this 
question is so great, that the parks must be established. The 
project has been fought no harder than the Water Board was ; 
and where would the city of Boston be, if the friends of that 
enterprise had not succeeded ? Act here to-night, and then let 
the city government do its part. Objections may be made by 
some gentlemen, made conscientiously ; but, five years from 



SPEECH OF MR. JOSEPH F. PAUL. 35 

now, these gentlemen will not remember that they raised any 
objection. 

This meeting is called for the purpose of giving the city 
government to understand that the business-men, the working- 
men, of the city, mean what they say, when they say that they 
want public parks ; and there is no question that an impulse 
will be given to the action of the city government by this 
meeting. We are the city of Boston ; and the members of the 
city government act for us. 

Gentlemen, it is getting late, and there are those to follow 
who will entertain you better than I can. But I propose to 
close with a little story which I heard ; and it was in church 
that I heard it, in an excellent sermon. Just after the war of 
1812, our laboring men stood, as they stand to-day, idling about 
the wharves and public places. That was the case in a little 
town to the east of Boston. They had enterprising men, as we 
have now ; and one day a gentleman stepped into a bank, and 
said to the president, " Mr. President, I am going to build a 
ship." — " What do you know about shipbuilding? " asked the 
president. " Nothing. But I can do the business ; and there 
are men here who can do the work. We have the money, and 
there are the men. I will build the ship, and sell it ; you will 
get your money back ; and the profit will be divided among the 
men." The idea was a novel one ; but the president wanted to 
set the wheels of business in motion ; and so he said that he 
would give an answer the next day. The gentleman called 
promptly the next morning ; and the president informed him 
that the directors had agreed to advance the money. The gen- 
tleman then went out among the idle men, and said, " I am going 
to build a ship, and I want you to do the work. I will pay 
you enough to live on ; and, when the ship is built, we will 
divide the profit." So they went to work as co-partners, and 
built the ship, this gentleman generously attending to the busi- 
ness. The ship was built and launched and sold, the money 
was paid to the bank, and the profits divided. That was the 
first ship built on the Merrimack in Newburyport, which has 
since become one of the largest shipbuilding places in Massa- 
chusetts. 



36 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

So we want something to set the wheels in motion. The city 
of Boston can borrow the money, and buy the land, for these 
parks, more cheaply now than ever again ; and the men are ready 
to do the work. I know of nothing more that I can say. I am 
glad to see this hall filled to-night. There are men here to- 
night who have at heart the interests and prosperity of the 
city of Boston. That is what we are acting for ; and I trust 
that that hundred men will go up to City Hall, and, if the 
city government will move in the matter, every true man will 
deem it his duty to stand behind and encourage them. 

The President. My friends, the best things and the most 
enthusiastic meetings must come to an end ; but those who wait 
till the last generally get the best. I have now the pleasure 
of introducing to you the closing speaker, the Hon. P. A. 
Collins. 

SPEECH OF THE HON. P. A. COLLINS. 

I know that no word of mine can add to the force of this 
movement. I am neither great tax-payer nor eminent sanitarist. 
I cannot hope to equal others who have discussed the moral, 
eesthetic, sanitary, and economic phases of the question before 
us. But, happily, there is no need of such discussion now. The 
question of public parks has been submitted, in all its forms 
and probable effects, to the ablest, keenest, wisest, of our citizens ; 
and there is but one answer. The answer is, that we need 
more out-door life than our sedentary race enjoys, and that 
public grounds, accessible to all, are not only desirable, but 
necessary to the moral and physical health of our crowded pop- 
ulation. 

This is the verdict ; and, granted this, there remain but two 
questions, — " Is this the time ? " " Can we afford it? " To 
some, the present is never the time for any thing. Their motto 
seems to be, " Don't do to-day what you can put off till to- 
morrow, because you may not live till to-morrow, and then you 
won't have to do it at all." This principle has been acted upon 
by short-sighted Boston too long ; and the result is a melan- 



SPEECH OF THE HON. P. A. COLLINS. 37 

choly looking-back to the time when improvements could have 
been made for a tenth or a fifteenth of the present cost. We 
are told of our beautiful suburbs, as if they can be suburbs 
forever. Even now, they are but for the rich. Beware of 
trespassing in the fields .and woods : they are private property. 
The roads seem to belong to blood-horses and their owners. 
If you wish to know the future, look at the past. Look back, 
you aged men, to the fields and gardens of Tremont and Boyl- 
ston Streets. Look back, you younger men, to rambles through 
South Boston farms, and land at "South End" sold by* the 
acre. Always comes the old conservative admonition, " Wait ! " 
— yes, wait till the great sea-wall makes City Point of Castle 
Island, — wait till the now extended arms of Boston clasp 
Brookline to the bosom of the metropolis, — wait till private 
avarice and easy legislation, acting intermittently, deface the 
shore and basin of Charles River, — wait till the dense and ever 
growing population, bursting from its narrow bounds, spreads 
itself in streets laid out at random, over what you are pleased 
to call our suburbs, — wait, in short, till the inevitable happens, 
and where are your public parks ? You may have them, even 
then, I grant you ; but you will have them where the people 
cannot reach them, and where the cost will be too great. 
Remember that our city growth is like the growth of all cities 
in the New World and the Old ; and, if we want green places 
in the future Boston, we must seize them now. 

Can we- afford the expense ? Rather, let us ask, Can Boston 
afford to be less comfortable to live in, less attractive, less 
healthy, than sister cities ? We can afford police, paved streets, 
light, sewers, scavengers, a fire department, a board of health, 
and a score of other agencies, not because they give salaries and 
employment to certain men, but because the public health and 
safety require it ; we can afford schools, maintained at enormous 
cost, though it may be conceded that we could live without 
education ; we can afford pure water in abundance, be the 
expense never so great, because we need it : and, if we need 
pure air, we can afford to pay for it, to seize the means of hav- 
ing it, and keeping it forever. 

And suffer me, with due modesty, to say, that we in this 



38 PARES FOR THE PEOPLE. 

meeting — representing as we do the commerce, industries, and 
professions of this goodly town — have a right to demand that 
what we ask shall be given us, and that Boston shall take and 
hold for the use of its people this needed reservation, while yet » 

there is time. I trust our city fathers will need no further 
admonition than this meeting gives; hut, if they should, we are 
enlisted for the war. / 

As Cromwell, grimly looking down on the fair fields and 
shining streams of the land he came to conquer, said, " This is 
a land worth fighting for," so let us, as we survey the magnifi- 
cent area of shore and hill and glade which fortune now permits 
us to dedicate to public use, exclaim, " This, indeed, is worth 
our effort ; " and let us strive for it till the battle is won. 

The President. I have been requested to state that the 
well-known physician, Dr. Edward H. Clarke, who is too ill 
to be present here to-night, has written a long and interesting 
letter on the subject of this meeting, which will be published in 
the morning papers ; and I desire that every citizen present will 
make a point of reading that letter. 



LETTER OF DR. EDWARD H. CLARKE. 

Hamilton A. Hill, Esq., Secretary, &c. 

Dear Sir, — I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of 
your note of the 2d inst., requesting me, in the name of the 
committee who have called a public meeting on the park ques- 
tion, to address to them a letter which shall contain my views 
upon " the necessity existing at the present time for action on 
this subject, and upon the Report of the Park Commissioners." 

If my views are of any value to the community on this ques- 
tion, or if I could exert any influence, however little, in bringing 
about a result so necessary to the comfort, prosperity, and health 
of all the citizens of Boston, as the establishment of a public 
park within the limits of the city, I should esteem it not less 
a privilege than a duty to present those views, and exert that 
influence. 



I 



\ 



LETTER OF DR. EDWARD E. CLARKE. 39 

Among the many and weighty considerations that might be 
appropriately urged in favor of the establishment of a park in 
this city, three stand out so prominently, that their importance 
can scarcely be overestimated. These are, first, the sanitary, 
second, the educational, and, third, the economic aspects of the 
question. Let me call your attention briefly to these three 
points. 

The first is the sanitary aspect of the park. The discussion 
of sewerage and drainage, and of the ventilation of sewers, 
drains, and houses, with which our community have latterly 
been made familiar, has impressed upon our citizens, to some 
extent, the importance of introducing pure air into our houses, 
and of keeping foul air out of them. The importance of such 
ventilation cannot be overstated. But we are in danger of 
forgetting that the importance of ventilating a city is as great 
as that of ventilating all the houses in it, with this difference, 
that if a city is not well ventilated, so as to bring fresh air into 
it, and to keep foul air and poisonous gases out of it, the ven- 
tilation of individual dwellings will be of little avail. 

The foul air of the streets will not only envelop those who 
pass through them, but will penetrate the houses that line them, 
visiting alike the sick and the well, increasing the danger of 
disease to the former, and diminishing the health and strength 
of the latter. In proportion as a city increases in size, large 
open spaces should be reserved. Parks are the lungs of the 
city. They are more than this : they are reservoirs of oxygen 
and fresh air. They produce atmospheric currents, which sweep 
through and purify the streets. Parks not only offer oxygen to 
all who visit them, but distribute a large amount of this prime 
necessity of life everywhere in their neighborhood. Without open 
spaces appropriately placed, it is impossible, in a large city, to 
have well ventilated streets, and to keep the air of the houses 
sweet and clean. Let us remember, moreover, that bad venti- 
lation means poisoned air, and that poisoned air is sure to be 
followed by a ghastly train of diseases, with an occasional pes- 
tilence to remind the inhabitants what a terrible thing it is to 
disregard sanitary laws. 

Improved ventilation is by no means the only sanitary good 



40 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

that parks yield to a city wise enough to possess them. A frac- 
tion, and only a small fraction, of our population, are able to 
■leave the city during the hot months of the year, for the country. 
When these favored ones reach Nahant, Swampscott, or New- 
port, or some modest farmhouse, or comfortable dwelling by 
the side of the many railroads that lead from the foulness of the 
city to the purity of the country, or of the mountains, how » 

gladly and enthusiastically they speak of their escape from 
heat, discomfort, and disease, to coolness, comfort, and health ! 
But the mass of the community, — the artisans and work-people, 
whose necessities compel them to remain within the limits of 
the city, — their families, children, sick ones and all, have at 
present no such escape from close and impure air. 

The carrying of little children who are pinched by cholera- 
infantum, or spotted by scarlet-fever, or of those who are para- 
lyzed by diphtheria, or distorted by scrofula, or emaciated by g 
consumption, for a few hours a day into the pure air and bright 
sunlight of an open square, has saved many a life. Many a 
needless death has occurred, because the city afforded no such 
opportunity for escape. A few hours' exposure of a child on a 
mother's lap, or in a basket or carriage, to the freshness of a 
park, will produce a sleep that never follows opium, chloral, or 
ether, and will yield a chance for health that no drug can give. 
For the last few years, Philadelphia has shown a diminished 
death-rate. Dr. William Pepper, who has lately investigated 
the sanitary condition of that city, commenting upon the grati- 
fying fact just stated, says, " While thus showing an average 
rate of mortality more favorable than that found in any other 
city containing over 500,000 inhabitants, Philadelphia has 
recently (1874) attained a degree of healthfulness almost un- 
paralleled ; namely, with a population at that time of 775,000, 
the number of deaths was but 14,966, giving a death-rate of only 
19.3 per thousand. These very favorable results are largely due 
to the abundant and cheap water-supply, and to the opportu- 
nities given, even to the poorest citizens, for the enjoyment of 
pure country air in the great Fairmount Park, which contains 
2,991 acres. The extent to which this is valued by the citizens 
^may be inferred from the fact, that, during the year 1875, the 



LETTER OF DR. EDWARD H. CLARKE. 



41 



park was visited by over eleven million persons." There is no 
reason why a park in Boston should not yield as good a sanitary 
result as one in Philadelphia. 

While looking at the sanitary aspects of this subject, let us 
not forget that a park laid out in accordance with the plan of 
the Park Commissioners will utilize localities that would other- 
Avise become plague-spots, and nurseries of disease. The low 
lands along the banks of Charles River, portions of the Back 
Bay, and other sections that might be mentioned, are sure to 
become unhealthy localities, — stations for distributing the 
germs of disease throughout their neighborhood and at a dis- 
tance from them, — unless they are reserved, and left unoccupied. 
The most extravagant way of disposing of such localities is for 
the city to permit them to be built over, " improved " is the phrase, 
I believe, and then suffer the consequences, in the way of increase 
of disease and taxes, which follow such sort of improvements. 

Let us now pass from the sanitary to the educational aspect 
of our subject. The educational value of a park to the com- 
munity of a large city is second only to its sanitary value. We 
are too apt to think that education is the exclusive function of 
the school, and that books and school-teachers are the only 
educators. This is a grievous mistake. The education of the 
home and street, of the workshop and store, of the church and 
theatre, of the base-ball club and the evening party, of the rum- 
shop and dance-hall, and of the numerous other influences of a 
great city, is more potent than that of the school. The evil of 
all evil agencies is intensified, and the good of the good ones 
diminished, by uncleanness and impure air. Clean hands and 
a pure heart go together. Foul air prompts to vice, and oxygen 
to virtue, as surely as sunlight paints the flowers, and ripens the 
fruits, of our gardens. The tired workman, who, after a day's 
labor, needs the repose and relaxation of home, is apt to be 
driven from it by the close atmosphere of the street and house 
in which he lives. He would, if he could, get into the fresh 
air of the country ; but, as he cannot do this, he seeks the relief 
which drink or other excitement yields. If there were a park 
accessible to him, he with his family would seek it as instinc- 
tively as a plant stretches towards the light. The varied op- . 



42 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

portunities of a park would educate him and his family into the 
enjoyment of innocent amusements and open-air pleasures. 
Deprived of these, he and his are educated into the ways of 
disease and vice by the character of their surroundings. Who 
that has watched the groups of families, neighbors, and friends, 
that bivouac by hundreds and thousands on the parks which 
cluster around, adorn, and invigorate the great cities of 
Europe, can have failed to notice the innocent amusements and 
enjoyment of these crowds of young and old, or to be impressed 
with the fact that the influence of the natural scenes around 
them, of the trees and plants and flowers, of the pure air and 
bright skies, is a humanizing and elevating one? It is difficult 
to compute the value of such an influence in dollars and cents, 
or to measure it by any scale that the market acknowledges; 
but it is, nevertheless, a real, substantial, and potent one. If 
our large cities are the pride and boast of the republic, they 
also contain the greatest elements of danger to the state and 
the nation. Ignorance and vice, disease and crime, crowd them- 
selves into cities. There they find their best hiding-places, 
their surest protection, and their most defenceless victims. It 
makes one tremble to think of the thousands of youth in our 
cities whom the school and the church do not reach, and who 
are moulded by these influences into the worst and lowest forms 
of humanity. They can not and will not go out into the country 
themselves, except upon some errand of violence and crime. 
The city should therefore bring the country to them, and give 
them a chance, at least, to experience its humanizing and blessed 
influence. 

A park, or a series of parks, with its trees and running 
waters, its grass and plants and flowers, its variegated surface 
and changing views, and all the beauty with which such scenes 
are flooded, supplements the labor of the church and school in 
educating, refining, and elevating . the community. There will 
be less gambling, drinking, and quarrelling in Boston, when the 
mass of its inhabitants shall be allowed to partake of the bless- 
ing and beauty of a public park. 

These considerations naturally bring us to the third point 
which has been mentioned, viz., the economic aspect of the 



LETTER OF DR. EDWARD H. CLARKE. 43 

matter. Few will deny the truth of the above statements ; but 
the admission of their truth is apt to be coupled with the reply, 
" The park will cost so much, we cannot afford it." It is true 
that it will cost a good deal, but not so much to each household 
as the inevitable cost of the sickness, vice, and death, which the 
opportunities that a park provides would prevent. Are human 
life and health and virtue so cheap, that we can afford to count 
the cost of procuring and maintaining them ? Are vice, crime, 
and disease so unimportant, that we can afford to let them 
thrive, and propagate themselves indefinitely ? We cannot 
repeat too often, or ponder too seriously, the statement made in 
the first report of the Park Commissioners : " Nothing is so 
costly as sickness and disease : nothing so cheap as health. 
Whatever promotes the former is the worst sort of extrava- 
gance : whatever fosters the latter is the truest economy." 
The truth is, it will cost the city of Boston more to get on with- 
out a park than to incur the expense of buying and taking care 
of one. We pay at present an enormous sum yearly for the 
maintenance of hospitals, prisons, jails, and workhouses. It is 
not asserted that the establishment of a park will depopulate 
these institutions, or render them unnecessary ; but no sanitarian 
will deny that one result, and a most important one, of the 
establishment of a park, would be to diminish the number of 
those who are compelled to resort to these institutions. A 
greater economy than all this would be found to accrue to each 
household in the increased comfort, diminished sickness, more 
vigorous health, and ample enjoyment, that would be added to 
all its members. 

Boston has been long and justly celebrated for its health, 
beauty, and wealth. If it loses the two first of these dis- 
tinctions, how long will it retain the last ? Business and popu- 
lation will turn away from an unhealthy and unattractive town. 
Defective sewerage and imperfect drainage are sapping the 
health ; and the occupation of the suburbs by houses, manu- 
factories, workshops, and stores, is destroying the beauty of 
the city. Will the merchants of Boston, whose reputation for 
intelligence, sagacity, and enterprise has gone out to the ends 
of the world, permit a false economy to blind them to the im- 
^portance of this whole matter ? ,S 



s, 



44 PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE. 

Of the details of the financial question, I am not qualified to 
speak ; but I will venture a single remark. It seems only a 
piece of common sense to one unfamiliar with the intricate prob- 
lems of finance to say, that, if the present time is one of great 
depression of values, it is precisely the time when a wealthy 
corporation like the city of Boston can purchase the land for a 
park at the lowest price, and therefore should do it. 

Permit me to add a single word with regard to the plan pro- 
posed by the Commissioners. It offers more advantages, and 
fewer disadvantages, than any other that has been proposed. 
This might be expected, when we reflect that it was prepared in 
accordance with the advice of Mr. Olmstead, than whom no 
one is better qualified to advise in such matters. It may be 
safely asserted, that if Boston should accept this plan, and au- 
thorize it to be carried out, the city would possess a park unique 
in its character, of unrivalled beauty,* and one which all our 
citizens, young and old, rich and poor, would greatly enjoy, and 
of which, if they once. obtained it, they would never be bribed 
to dispossess themselves. 

The Rev. Dr. Ellis, in his recent eloquent address at the cen- 
tennial anniversary of the evacuation of Boston, used the fol- 
lowing language, " As I read the history of our fathers in all 
their generations, their toil and virtue seem to me to have been 
the noblest, in their steady regard for the welfare and happiness 
of their posterity. And as I firmly believe that no single indi- 
vidual can follow the highest pattern of an earthly life, unless 
his hope and faith link on to a future, so I find it proved in all 
biographies and annals, that all unselfish, noble, and heroic lives 
are those which parents lead for their children and their chil- 
dren's children. We have such lives among us in city, state, 
and nation, private and public, high and humble." May we be 
true to the reputation and tradition of our fathers, and provide 
as intelligently for the well-being of ourselves and our posterity 
as they provided for themselves and for us ! 

I am, with great respect, very truly yours, 

Edw. H. Clarke. 

Arlington Street, Boston, June 6, 1876. 



COMMITTEE OF ONE HUNDRED. 



45 



The President, in calling for a vote on the resolutions, saicf^k 
merely wish to say that old Faneuil Hall can stand a great deal 
of noise ; but still I would recommend, for the benefit of future 
audiences, that you should not take off the roof, nor burst the 
windows, nor put out the gas. [Laughter.] 

The resolutions were unanimously agreed ' to ; and the fol- 
lowing committee of a hundred, to present the result of the 
meeting to the city government, was appointed ; the assembly 
dispersing shortly after ten o'clock. 

COMMITTEE OF ONE HUNDKED. 



Joseph S. Ropes 
Marshall P. Wilder 
Oliver W. Holmes, M.D. 
Richard Frothingham 
Samuel Cabot, M D. 
J. Baxter Upham, M.D. 
Thomas J. Gargan 
George C. Richardson 
John P. Reynolds, M.D. 
John W. Candler 
George B. Chase 
William E. Coffin 
Francis A. Osborn 
Ralph Crooker 
Robert Seaver 
J. Mitchell Galvin 
W. W. Morland, M.D. 
Richard Olney 
Joseph W. Balch 
C. Allen Richards 
Charles L. Thayer 
William E. Perkins 
James Edwards 
J. Tisdale Bradlee 
Jonas Fitch 
James Sturgis 
J. N. Borland, M.D. 
Charles W. Slack 
Clement H. Hill 
William V. Hutchings 
William T. Hart 



William P. Hunt 
Hamilton A. Hill 
Joseph F. Paul 
Charles W. Wilder 
M. F. Dickinson, jun. 
P. A. Collins 
Albert Bowker 
John C. Pratt 
Jerome Jones 
H. H. A. Beach, M.D. 
S. J. Langmaid, M.D. 
Joseph H. Chadwick 
Benjamin Deane 
J. J. McNutt 
Nath. Adams 

B. F. Nourse 
Martin Griffin 
John J. May 
M. Doherty 

Thomas B. Curtis, M.D. 
Thomas Gogin 
Royal E. Robbins 
William W. Clapp 

E. B. Haskell 

C. F. Donnelly 

T. Quincy Browne 

F. E. Goodrich 
Charles W. Morris 

D. N. Skillings 
Hales W. Suter 
Henry Smith 



46 



PARES FOR THE PEOPLE. 



Robert Johnson 
Asa P. Potter 
William J. R. Evans 
Charles Nowell 
Jacob Piaff 
Eben D. Jordan 
George Woods Rice 
Thomas Mack 
Lewis Coleman 
Charles F. Choate 
Roland Worthington 
M. B. Leonard, M.D. 
A. H. Lewis 
George G. Crocker 
Charles L. Haley 
Waldo Adams 
John F. Pay son 
Hollis Hunnewell 
Martin Hayes 



William Atherton 
Charles J. Bishop 
Aaron D. Williams 
Henry C. Morse 
S. Parkman Dexter 
George P. King 
Albert Thompson 
Joseph Dix 
H. M. Bearce 
Wiliam B. Bacon 
George O. Carpenter 
Henry J. Nazro 
J. Kent Crowley 
James N. Spillane 
W. H. Forbes 
J. B. Dacey 
James F. Gray 
John Bigelow 
A. Claxton Cary 



m 3.f« 



THE PEOPLE. 




PUBLIC MEETING 



HELD AT 



<■. 



k PANEUIL HALL, 



JUNE 7, 1876. 




BOSTON : 

FRANKLIN PRESS: RAND, AVERY, & CO. 

1876. 



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